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Epic exoplanet 63 EP

HAT-P-40 b

RA 335.5129° · Dec 45.4573° · exoplanet

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Score breakdown

· 8 badges
63 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Lava world +14
  • Puffy low-density world +12
  • Tidally locked +10
  • Orbits a Sun-like star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Confirmed exoplanet +5
  • Gas giant +4
  • Blasted by starlight +4
Total score 63

15 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Confirmed exoplanet · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Gas giant · +4
  • Lava world · +14
  • Tidally locked · +10
  • Puffy low-density world · +12
  • Blasted by starlight · +4
  • Orbits a Sun-like star · +8

Trivia

What makes it special

  • Lava world. Its surface is almost certainly an ocean of molten rock, kept liquid by the star it hugs.

Hard to believe

  • It would float. It is less dense than water. Drop it in a big enough ocean and the whole world would bob on the surface.

What it actually is

  • Hugging its star. It orbits closer to its star than Mercury does to the Sun, completing a lap in less time than Mercury takes.
  • What it is made of. Lighter than Neptune — a puffed-up ball of hydrogen and helium with no surface anywhere on it to stand on.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 11.3 you'll want a small backyard telescope.
  • Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around August — that's when to go looking.

Properties

density gcc
0.15
diameter km
217336.0536
discovery facility
HATNet
discovery method
Transit
discovery year
2012
dist ly
1514.8935
eccentricity
0
eq temp k
1770
host star teff
6080
inclination
88.3
insolation
1747.4151
mag
11.34
mass earth
152.5584
name
HAT-P-40 b
orbital period days
4.4572
radius earth
17.0377
semi major au
0.0608
sys num planets
1
sys num stars
1
tidally locked
yes
tidally locked inferred
yes

About HAT-P-40 b

HAT-P-40 b is an epic exoplanet. It lies about 1,514.9 light-years from Earth, shines at apparent magnitude 11.34, has an equilibrium temperature near 1,770 K and spans roughly 17.04 Earth radii.

Its surface is almost certainly an ocean of molten rock, kept liquid by the star it hugs.

How to see it

At apparent magnitude 11.34, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, HAT-P-40 b is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.

Why HAT-P-40 b is an epic exoplanet

HAT-P-40 b scores 63 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 15 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 8 science badges — Confirmed exoplanet, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Gas giant, Lava world, Tidally locked, Puffy low-density world, Blasted by starlight and Orbits a Sun-like star — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.